


The Tipping Point

by ominousrum



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Fluff, Leo Fitz is an oblivious cupcake, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-19
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-25 11:47:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9819050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ominousrum/pseuds/ominousrum
Summary: Leopold Fitz was lucky. Why rock the proverbial boat?





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [muchadoaboutdoctorwho](https://archiveofourown.org/users/muchadoaboutdoctorwho/gifts).



> written as part of the Fitzsimmons Secret Valentines Exchange!

Leopold Fitz considered himself lucky, for the most part. He had a job in his field working with people he actively liked. He had his health as his mum was eager to remind him of whenever she sensed the slightest bit of moping during their long-distance phone calls. He had a mum he loved very much who thought the world of him. He had friends (it didn’t matter if he could count them on one hand, they were enough for _dozens_ ). He got to spend time hanging out with a beautiful genius he considered to be his _best_ friend – a woman whose eyes he would happily gaze into for the rest of his life. He had all of that and if he never got anything _more_ , well that would be okay. He was lucky. 

It would be his own fault, really, if he never got anything more. He had four years of university to tell Jemma Simmons how he felt about her. Even if he discounted the first year as the awkward navigation into the friendship they had now, it was still a solid three years.

Luck was on his side when he met one of the few British students at his American university. Luck was on his side when she actually struck up a conversation with him. Luck was on their side when they realized they worked best as a team, bouncing ideas off of one another like an endless tennis match.

Falling in love with Jemma didn’t happen overnight, of course. She was gorgeous, to be sure, but that was only icing on the kind, wonderfully imperfect cake. He fell in love only after endless hours studying together; wordlessly passing books back and forth once one knew the other had finished. He fell in love with the crinkle in her forehead when she worried and the gleam in her amber eyes when all the pieces fell into place.

Three years of watching Jemma light up every room, three years of his heart feeling like it would burst every time she said “Fitz, you’re _brilliant!_ ”, three years of hearing her laugh like it was the most beautiful sound in the world. It would be enough to make anyone fall in love with her, really.

Unfortunately for Fitz, it did.

After three amazing but torturous years, Fitz was determined to finally confess his feelings to Jemma. Graduation day was the perfect opportunity – they’d both be embarking on a new future, why shouldn’t they see how being together would change their lives? Anything was possible and the fact that they’d have no idea where it would go would be part of the thrill of it all.

He hadn’t prepared a speech per se, as he pictured himself stumbling over his words. He imagined he would take her hand and ask her to dinner. Simple and straightforward. He’d beamed her a wide smile when he saw her across the lawn after the ceremony, chatting with her parents who had flown in from England; his own mum busy asking their mutual friend Daisy Johnson all sorts of embarrassingly personal questions.

Right after he’d straightened his shoulders and taken a deep breath but before he’d moved a single step, Milton Richards beat him to it. The physics major with the broccoli head took Jemma aside to speak to her. Initially Fitz was merely irritated that his big moment would be delayed - he wasn’t entirely sure his heart could take much more of its erratic beating. Irritation morphed into icy dread as he watched them exchange phone numbers, Milton ending their interaction with a swift kiss to her cheek.

The two ended up dating for three months and it was all Fitz could do to fight off the wave of nausea that crept up at the sight of them. As soon as the nausea would subside, a delightful mix of guilt and self-loathing would replace it. Fitz cursed himself for not being happy for Jemma. Jemma’s happiness, unequivocally, was what mattered most. He cursed himself for his own cowardice.

(Later he cursed Milton for his inability to keep Jemma happy as he watched his dear friend dissolve into watery sadness after their break-up).

Now nearly a year after graduation, Fitz and Jemma had managed to stay close; both landing jobs in Boston. Fitz an engineer for an up and coming tech company, Jemma a chemist at one of the largest research facilities in the east coast. Daisy landed a radio job downtown, ecstatic to have found a paying gig for her insomnia-fuelled social justice rants. They all kept in touch with their mutual friend Hunter (Brit #3) and his on again off again American girlfriend Bobbi.

Leopold Fitz was lucky. Why rock the proverbial boat?

***

 

The first thing that struck Fitz as he slid into Jemma and his favourite booth at their go-to diner was Jemma somehow looked even more breathtaking than usual. She was wearing a deep violet blouse that made her freckled skin glow and her hair pulled up into a soft bun drew all attention to her lovely face. He tried not to imagine all the scenarios which would lead to Jemma magically increasing in attractiveness, though the prospect of her upping her game for a new suitor felt like a punch in the stomach.

“Oh Fitz, I didn’t notice you there! I was so absorbed in reading about a brand new type of coral they’ve discovered in the Seychelles. Can you believe there are over a thousand species of fish down there?”

“Can’t say I was aware of that fact until this very moment,” he smirked. Passionate Jemma was definitely one of his favourite Jemmas.

“Imagine snorkeling and seeing them all up close!”

“Imagine having to wear a bloody wetsuit.” Fitz deadpanned.

“Maybe we should take a trip like that one day,” Jemma looked up at him with something akin to hope shining in her eyes.  

Fitz snorted. “Are you serious? I’d much rather watch Planet Earth on the telly.”

“Of course. Not something that interests you, I get it.” Jemma reached for her tea, taking a long sip.

Fitz couldn’t help but think he’d managed to do something wrong. Perhaps Jemma had finally gotten tired of the tactless curmudgeon she deemed to call her best friend.

“Your hair… it’s different,” he offered, cheeks flushing distinctly pink.

Jemma blinked in response, setting her mug quietly down on the placemat.

“Not bad different, just _different_.” His lips curled into a small smile as he bent the edge of the menu between his fingers.

Jemma replied with a weary chuckle but her mood visibly lightened for the rest of the evening. 

***

 

Two weeks later Daisy arranged for Fitz, Jemma, Hunter, and Bobbi to blow off some steam at their favourite pub.  It was always hilarious when the gang of them got together, especially if Hunter and Bobbi were in full-on competitive mode. Fitz had to dodge an air hockey puck on his way to join Jemma and Daisy; Bobbi’s smack talk ringing in his ears as he offered her and Hunter a wave.

“Is that a new shirt, Fitz?” Jemma asked as soon as he’d shrugged his coat off. Daisy simultaneously choked on her drink, spluttering into soft hiccups as her eyes danced between him and Jemma.

“Wha? I fink so,” he mumbled through a mouthful of pretzels he’d grabbed the second he spotted them.

“I like it. I daresay it makes you look even more handsome than usual.” Jemma gave him an approving nod.

Fitz’s mouth lost all remaining moisture and he wasn’t entirely sure it could solely be blamed on the pretzels.

Clearly he needed to catch up on drinks if Jemma’s beer goggles were that thick already. 

***

 

A dreary Wednesday and Fitz was flexing his tired hands and squeezing his eyes shut in lieu of an _actual_ break from his current project. He imagined there were at least five separate kinks in his neck and shoulders from spending hours hunched over schematics and parts for the cloaking technology he was experimenting with.

Once he opened his eyes again, he saw his co-worker Mack greeting Jemma just beyond their workspace door with a warm smile, Jemma handing him a coffee before waving to Fitz.

“Jemma, I didn’t expect to see you here…” Even if his eyes hadn’t been sore, the sight of Jemma beaming at him wearing what looked like the softest cream-coloured sweater in the known universe would’ve soothed them.

“I thought I’d surprise you,” she said, handing him a to-go cup no doubt containing tea, “since I have the day off and had to come this way to run some errands anyway.”

Fitz stared absent-mindedly at his cup, eyes tracing the pattern of a small heart drawn on the lid. “Did you want to grab a quick lunch? I should probably step away for a bit anyway.”

“Fitz, it’s half two.”

“Is it? I suppose I should’ve eaten something in the last 6 hours, then.” As if on cue his stomach gave a feeble rumble.

“I thought that might be the case, so I brought you your favourite sandwich.” Jemma took a clearly homemade sandwich wrapped in wax paper and twine out of her purse.

“Prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella with a hint of pesto aioli?”

“That’s the one.”

“You’re an angel, you know that don’t you?”

Jemma chuckled “Don’t work too hard, Fitz. See you Saturday?”

“Definitely.”

Mack sauntered up to him as Jemma left, unadorned coffee cup in hand. “You know Turbo, you’re a lucky guy.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

***

 

Movie nights in were to be cherished, as far as Fitz was concerned. Jemma insisted they take place at least once a week, more often if one of them was under the weather or needed a reason to unwind. Typically they’d stick to bad movies or overrated blockbusters – making snide remarks about the terrible acting, plot lines completely outside the realm of plausibility, and epic science fails. Jemma always hosted, Fitz was a definite yes unless he got held up at work, and Daisy flitted in and out sometimes dependent on the movies that were lined up.

Last week Daisy sighed halfway through The Brain That Wouldn’t Die to exclaim “You two keep finishing each other’s sentences, it’s like you’re psychically linked.” Jemma flushed a brilliant coral colour at that.

This week movie night couldn’t come soon enough for Fitz. His project at work seemed to be turning up more problems than solutions and the long nights with no social outlet was rubbing his patience raw.

Jemma opened her front door with a dazzling smile, clad in a sapphire wrap dress. Fitz noticed a faint scent of jasmine hanging around her in an alluring cloud and her chestnut hair fell in soft waves around her shoulders. Maybe she’s just come back from a date, Fitz tried not to let the thought twist a knot into his stomach.

She motioned for him to come in before rushing to the kitchen to grab their drinks and snacks. Fitz knew better than to ask if she needed help – Jemma would simply roll her eyes and shoo him away. She liked preparing things just _so_ , and only expected him to clean up once they were finished and occasionally cover the bill for the Chinese food or pizza they ordered in.

“Daisy couldn’t make it?” Fitz tried his best to put on a mask of disappointment upon realizing Daisy was nowhere in sight, plunking himself down on the sofa. Truthfully, he looked forward to alone time with Jemma, however infrequent or quiet. Not that anything untoward would happen, apart from Jemma occasionally resting her head on his shoulder when she got sleepy. The main draw was just being with her. Being around Jemma made him happy.

“Daisy? Oh, no Daisy won’t be able to join us for a couple of weeks. She’s got her eye on that dashing pilot we met the other week,” Jemma grinned, a dreamy expression across her face. “I told her to go for it.”

Fitz made a non-committal grunt. Antoine Triplett certainly did capture the attention of both ladies when they had all met. He felt like the human equivalent of boiled cabbage next to Trip’s stupidly handsome face. Also he’d asked them to call him Trip, which was infringing on Fitz’s ‘whole refer to me by my last name only’ policy. Trip sounded strong and trustworthy, Fitz sounded like a rimshot.

“Since when does Daisy _not_ go for it?”

“Oh, well I just meant that I told her not to waste any time. That she deserves to be happy _now_ , if that’s what she wants.” Jemma bit her bottom lip as she turned to look at him. “Especially after last year.”

Daisy had gone through a bad break-up with a rather violent man the year prior. A man they’d once all considered to be their friend before his true colours came out. Fitz felt his blood boil at the mere memory.

“Jemma Simmons, life coach.”

“Oh, shut up!” She threw a Cheeto at him which he managed to catch expertly between his lips, earning an impressed eyebrow raise from Jemma.

“So what cinematic masterpieces do we have to look forward to tonight?”

“I thought maybe it was time for something different? I’ve got some fantasy/sci-fi films lined up.”

Fitz wondered how much tension he may have to diffuse if their viewing choices led to plenty of romantic scenes. Usually this amounted to him staying absolutely still and offering up a quip about how loud the onscreen kissing ended up being.

By the time Ladyhawke gave way to Stardust they had eaten through a large pizza and a box of potato wedges.

“Fitz?” Jemma peeped beside him just as the protagonist of the film appeared to be getting her happy ending. She had cozied up to his shoulder early tonight, her breath warming his side when she spoke.

“Hmm?”

“Do you ever wish…” her voice trailed off for a full minute before continuing, “do you ever want things to change but you’re not sure how to go about it?”

Fitz felt his throat close up as he stamped down the longing in his chest. God, he wished he could just shift slightly and tilt his face towards her, to capture her lips and tell her everything he couldn’t say with words. What good would that do, though? Drive away the main source of joy in his life, that’s what. Best to leave well enough alone.

“No. The last thing I want is for things to change.”

“Right,” Jemma stiffened slightly, straightening her neck to move away from him. “It’s getting late, I should probably get to bed.” The smile on her face – tight and thin – made him wish he’d had the nerve to admit he wanted _desperately_ for their situation to change. Nevertheless he knew he wasn’t prepared for the fallout to be never seeing her face again if things went south.

“Yeah, of course. Sorry, didn’t mean to overstay my welcome.”

“You haven’t,” Jemma reassured, “I’m just tired all of a sudden.”

“Okay, yeah. Let me just wash these dishes and I’ll be on my way.”

“No, it’s alright – leave them.” Jemma let a ghost of a smile curl at her lips.

Great, he’d screwed up and somehow pushed her away. Why did he have to sabotage his own life so expertly?

“Jemma, I’m sorry if I’m useless to talk to. Sometimes I don’t realize how hopeless I can be at talking about things I want to avoid.”

“You’re _not_ useless, it’s me – I’m in a bit of a strange headspace right now.”

“I want you to know you can talk to me about anything,” Fitz tried to steady the quaver in his voice, “if you need to sort out how to change things or what will happen in the future, we can talk it through. Together.”

“Really?”

“Really. And I know I’m not exactly the most perceptive person but I can see you’ve been acting differently lately so it’s understandable you’d want to-“

“Oh, sod it!” Jemma interjected, launching herself at him and curling her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck as her impossibly warm lips attacked his own. Fitz felt all cohesive thought slide out of his brain. The only clear indication he was still alive was his heart thundering in his throat.

When Jemma pulled back, the only thought that slammed itself back into his head was that he hadn’t made any attempts to _kiss her back_. Jemma Simmons – the amazing, brilliant woman he was hopelessly in love with – had kissed him for some strange reason and he hadn’t even had the nerve to reciprocate.

“Sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make things awkward between us. I didn’t-“ Jemma was fumbling for words, sliding further and further away from him. This confused Fitz almost more than the kiss. Jemma was _flustered_ for god’s sake. Jemma for once didn’t have a full speech prepared, outlining all variables for the discussion at hand.

“I didn’t mean to jeopardize our friendship by making such an arse of myself. Please tell me I haven’t lost my best friend in the world because of it.”  

Fitz couldn’t find the words to articulate what he wanted to say but even if he could he seriously doubted he could have made his tongue cooperate. He kept staring at her, helplessly waiting for her to continue.

“I should have taken the hint when you rejected my other advances. I feel a bit silly, really.” Jemma was wringing her hands and looking like she wanted nothing more than to disappear into the floor.

“Other advances?” Fitz stammered. Advances? He’d missed Jemma’s _advances_? What did that even _mean?_

“And I get that just because we’re best friends that doesn’t mean that you’d fall for me or even think of me in that way. I just thought, well I suppose I hoped…” Jemma’s eyes changed course from their path of seemingly anywhere but Fitz to gaze directly into his face. Something in the way she looked at him burned bright and warm against his ribcage, stilling the heart stuttering in his throat.

“Anyway, it’s fine. I thought one last attempt would confirm things and it did. So now I can move on from… that.”

“Jemma-“ Fitz was startled to find his voice coming out barely above a whisper when it was screaming in his head.

“It’s okay, really. Hypothesises don’t always pan out the way we think. I’m just sorry you had to deal with all of _this_ and my rambling about it afterwards. Let’s forget it ever happened?”

“Jemma…”

“I can make myself scarce for a few weeks if that helps. Although Hunter’s birthday party is next week so that may present a problem. And actually the longer we go without speaking, the more awkward things may become.” Jemma winced and Fitz could see all the scenarios that were running through her mind.

“No.”

“What?”

“No I don’t want to forget it ever happened.” There, a definitive sentence. Something other than simply repeating Jemma over and over again. Jemma stared at him, clearly confused.

With that words started to fail him again but Fitz was bloody tired of waiting for them to come to his aid. He crossed the distance between him and Jemma in what felt like half a heartbeat; rushing forward to kiss her, hands pressing against the small of her back. Of all the emotions flooding through him the one that resonated the strongest was kissing Jemma felt like an anchor in a storm. A fixed point where the world finally made sense.

Fitz smiled as they pulled apart, relishing the feeling of the delicate weight of her hands on his chest.

“So I may have taken too strong a stance on the whole not wanting things to change bit.”

“It appears so,” Jemma let a sardonic smile replace the blissful one there moments before. Fitz could only speculate at the dopey expression he must have on own his face.  

“I still have no clue what you mean by advances, though.”

“ ** _Leopold Fitz!_** If I had been any less obvious I think Daisy would have spontaneously combusted from excitement!”

“That does sound like something Daisy might do.”

“I’ve been fielding questions from everyone non-stop about the progress. I think Hunter’s been cataloguing all of my failed attempts to help me improve my ‘game’.”

“Did _everyone_ know apart from me?” Fitz was gobsmacked at this admission.

“They have _eyes_ , Fitz. It wasn’t difficult for them to put two and two together.”

“Well, I can see a strong case for moving on to full snogging in that instance.” Fitz shook his head partially in disbelief, partially at his own obliviousness.

“Which you didn’t even react to! Then you got all quiet…”

“You know how I can be when I’m processing things.”

“You seriously didn’t know?” Jemma looked as exasperated as it was possible for her to look.

Fitz moved close enough to place a quick kiss to her temple as he laced his fingers with hers.

“Do you think I can make it up to you?” he asked with a hopeful smile.

“I’m certainly not opposed to vetting suggestions…”

“What say we start with a getaway to the Seychelles and go from there?”

“It’s a start.” Jemma grinned.


End file.
